


Only a Nightmare, Sir.

by ThatFunkyOpossum



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Prequel Trilogy, Star Wars: The Clone Wars (2008) - All Media Types
Genre: Angst, Canon Compliant, Clones speak Mando'a, Drowning, Edited and Reviewed, Gen, Graphic depictions of vomiting, Hurt No Comfort, Mild Horror, Nightmares, Order 66, POV Third Person Limited, Possession, Present Tense, Tear Jerker, Wholesome Friendships Between Clones, Whump, hinted at Unrequited Feelings
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-01
Updated: 2020-07-01
Packaged: 2021-03-04 21:46:40
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 2
Words: 5,305
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25013383
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ThatFunkyOpossum/pseuds/ThatFunkyOpossum
Summary: "The Mission... the one in our dreams, the one that never ends..."The clones would never tell you, but each of them fears the night, and the dreams it brings with it. Even Commanders like Bly. However, even if he hurts her while he sleeps, he knows he's loyal.A speculative piece that takes Tup's dying words very literally. I'm quite proud of this one, please give it a read. Be warned though, you're in for a painful time.
Relationships: CC-5052 | Bly & Aayla Secura, CC-5052 | Commander Bly & Original Characters (Platonic)
Comments: 45
Kudos: 122





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Be sure to read the tags in case of upsetting content. If I've missed anything, let me know. I'll be sure to add it.
> 
> Mando'a Used in order of appearance (if you're familiar with mando'a and I should revise these, or if i missed any words, please let me know)
> 
> Kih'vod - Younger Sibling (lit. "small sibling")  
> Vod'ika - Affectionate and Familiar Term for a Sibling  
> Jate’ca - Good Night  
> Jate'nuhoyir - Good Slumber (lit. Good un-awake)

Bly has a dream after Maridun, and it’s expected. He has a dream that he’s walking through the plains, watching the backs of his General Aayla Secura and the Padawan Commander Ahsoka Tano. The blades of tall, thick grass gently brush against his armor, tips occasionally poking through his blacks and into his joints. It’s quiet, save for the rustling. He wonders with vague curiosity how the General and Commander aren’t rubbing their exposed skin in annoyance. The grass prickles he’s had make him want to scratch until he tears through the ballistic fiber of his suit. With how little they’re wearing it has to be much worse for them. 

Maybe it’s that twi’leks and togruta aren’t bothered by grass prickles, Bly silently ponders. Then again, they’re Jedi, so maybe they’re just good at hiding it.

He glances to the side out of habit to check on the shinies, only to grip his blaster a little tighter. Lucky isn’t there. Neither is flash, or Cameron. Bly chews the inside of his cheek and glances back over his shoulder, wondering how many paces behind him their bodies are. They’ll have to pass by them again to get to the ship, and Bly can’t decide which is worse. That they’ll still be laying there, or that they’ll already have been scavenged. Poor damn kids. They’d just gotten to the 327th before this mission and hadn’t even had the opportunity to earn their paint yet. 

He wonders how he’ll tell their batchers. 

_Beep beep beep…_

Bly recoils out of surprise, but only slightly. Who could be comming him? Captain Rex, or maybe Admiral Yularen had found them, or…

_“Execute Order---”_

The number is just insubstantial fuzz that Bly doesn’t understand, but he feels the click in his brain, deep below his right temple. It’s like the snap of a tendon over a bone, and he can’t help but shudder at how unsettling it feels. Or maybe it’s the cold that has him trembling. He may not understand the number, but he recognizes it, the freeze setting into his bones is unforgettable. All of the orders are cold but whichever this one is… the others seem balmy. His fingers and lips go numb.

Bly is walking behind two rogue Jedi. The both of them are traitors to the Republic, and they’re dangerous. The one on the left is a blue Twi’lek adult, and the right a mostly orange Togruta child. They don’t see him as a threat yet. A stroke of luck for him, but a grave mistake for them. 

He raises his blaster as quietly as he can, taking aim at the Twi’lek’s head. A distant memory from the back of his mind seems to understand that the Twi’lek is a formidable warrior, so his job will be much easier if she’s dispatched first. Something in his stomach twists as the crosshairs settle, but good soldiers follow orders. Good soldiers follow orders no matter what. Good soldiers follow orders, or people get hurt. 

He fires. 

The Twi’lek goes down in a single shot, and he takes advantage of the confusion to execute the Togruta. She falls limp to the ground, crushing the grass beneath her. Bly looks at them both, bleeding face down into the soil and onto the plants, and he wonders why he feels sick. Something about the both of them feels more than familiar as the cold creeps out of his bones and back into his head. He crouches down to turn the little Togruta onto her back so he can look at her face. He does, and he recognizes her again. 

Bly wakes up with a start, practically scrambling out of his bed onto the floor in his haste to get away from the dream. The barracks are dark, and the floor is cold. Not as cold as the sensation still at the base of his neck and working its way up though. A light flicks on, and Bly squints, dim as it may be. A warm touch on his shoulder stills him. 

“Commander?” The voice belongs to Captain Brine. 

“It was-“ Bly covers his face and breathes deep. “It was so _real,_ Brine.” 

Brine frowns and touches the back of Bly’s neck, stroking the skin there. “You’re in the waking world now, Bly. It's alright.”

Bly lets himself slump against his brother’s warm body, letting the contact soothe and comfort him. No matter how hard he tries though, he can’t forget it. He can’t stop thinking about Commander Tano and her little body laying lifeless in the grass. Limbs splayed awkwardly, her eyes glassy and unseeing, face slack—

Brine pulls him closer, and Bly’s grateful for it. It’s not like he hasn’t had this dream before. He has. He always has it, actually. Whenever the space around him changes, whenever it’s new, he has the dream. A new planet, a new ship, it doesn’t matter. When the sights change, he has the dreams. He’s killed his general on Quell, Coruscant, every single cruiser he’s stepped foot in, the dozen or so little backwater planets he’s been to beside her. It doesn’t even matter how long he spends there. He always has it. 

It's always so real. So indistinguishable that when he first had it on Geonosis, he thought he’d actually done it. He’d _really_ panicked then. But it's been a few months since Geonosis, and he doesn’t react as badly after waking up anymore. The comforting arms try to pull Bly in closer, but he pushes himself away.

“Thanks Brine. I’m okay now.”

“Bly—“

“I said I’m okay. Let _go_ , and get back to bed, alright?” 

“...yes sir.”

Brine reluctantly lets go, hesitating as he does. The loss of body heat is instant, and Bly tries not to show how quickly he regrets the order. Regardless, he stands anyway, grateful for the momentary comfort but knowing that Brine couldn’t do any more for him. Judging by the look on his face, Bly’s kih’vod is about to collapse from exhaustion, and getting snuggled a little longer (however soothing it might feel) just isn’t worth asking Brine to sacrifice his well being. 

Bly offers Brine a hand to pull him up and he takes it. As Bly pulls him to his feet, he notices that Brine is moving strangely. He’s treating one of his legs rather gingerly, trusting most of his weight to the other. Brine’s not one to show weakness that he doesn’t have to, especially, _annoyingly_ , in front of Bly. So he’s a bit concerned. Their last mission must have been rough. 

“It’s not anything serious, is it Captain?” 

“What do you.. Oh. You mean this. Nah, Sir, it’s nothing.” Brine’s smile reaches his tired eyes as he chuckles and pushes down the waistband of his blacks to show an enormous patch of purple mottled skin covering his thigh. “Not unless you count one mother _kriffer_ of a bruise, anyway.” 

Bly winces with a grimace. “How did that even _happen?”_

Brine shrugs. “Oh, you know how it is working with shinies, sir. One of them..” Brine yawns. “One of them lost his nerve and nearly ran out into no-man’s land, right into the clanker’s fire.”

“And you, of course, stopped him?” Bly sighs at his brother, always playing the hero even against his own best interest. It’s hard to tell if the vague squirming nausea in his gut is left over from the dream, or well placed concern. Brine nods and grumbles as he rubs an eye. 

“I tackled him, and we took a nasty—” Brine yawns loudly, despite his attempts to stifle it, “nasty fall off a nearby ledge when I tackled him. Damn kid cracked my armor.” He says it with bite, but it's not hard for someone who knows him to see the calm happiness in his face. 

“Well, Captain, like you said, that _is_ one motherkriffer of a bruise.” He grabs Brine’s waistband and pulls his pants back up. “I want you to get as much rest as you can to heal it up as soon as possible.” Bly gently pats Brine’s shoulder. “Get some sleep, vod’ika.” 

“What about you, Bly?” 

“I’m going to take a walk.” 

Brine’s expression is soft as he reaches out and squeezes Bly’s arm gently. “Understood. Jate’ca, sir, and please,” his voice is quiet and pleading, “make sure you get some sleep yourself, alright?” 

Bly just sighs heavily and nudges Brine back towards his bunk with a smile. “Jate’nuhoyir, Brine.” 

Once Brine’s getting himself to bed, Bly pulls on his shoes and exits the barracks. 

There’s no night on the cruiser. There’s always activity, different companies each have their circadian rhythm slightly offset so that there’s always someone on duty. Bly walks to an observation deck over the hangar bay and watches the patrols, trying to name every trooper he can to distract himself from the sick feeling still clinging to his skin like a film. He squeezes the railing he’s leaned against as hard as he can until his knuckles are yellow, choking back a whimper as he remembers it. 

Little limbs, strong but weak, unmoving. The quiet thump as she fell to the ground. Horror splattered on the commander’s face, just like the gore. His crosshairs over General Secura’s head. 

Bly tries not to scream. 

He wants to scrub his skin until he bleeds and he can’t feel the dead flesh of a child against his hand. He wants to rip apart clankers until he feels as loyal as he _knows_ he is. He knows he’d never hurt them, and he takes a deep, shuddering breath. It’s okay. Bly touches the back of his head and steps away from the railing. He can’t let it settle, he thinks to himself as he shakes his body out. He won’t let a nightmare like this settle in his mind and let its memory stain the inside of his skull. 

The dreams aren’t him, the dreams aren’t real, and the dreams would _never_ be real.

Bly is loath to admit it, but he can’t stuff it down on his own. He has to see her, has to _know_ she’s safe before he can move on from this. Move on, at least until the next time he dreams. So he goes to the bridge, intending to wait for his General until she wakes up.

When Bly opens the door, she’s already there. He’s surprised and, judging by the look on her face when she turns to see him, General Secura is too. Whether that's because she’s never seen him in just his blacks before or because he should be half way through his sleep cycle, Bly doesn’t know. Her eyes are wide, lekku slightly perked up at their bases when her eyes meet his, but then she relaxes, lekku hanging heavily from her head, and she smiles. So warmly, so softly, she smiles. Bly’s guts squirm. 

General Secura turns back to the hologram filling up the room, it's a Jedi, probably, judging by the clothes, but Bly doesn’t recognize her. 

“Thank you for your help, Master Nu.”

His general bows to her, and the old woman bows back. Then the transmission ends, and General Secura turns back to him.

“Is there some reason you’re awake, Commander?” She asks with a firm gentleness.

He’s glad he got to see her so soon after his dream. Seeing her alive and well, eyes bright and sharp, the subtle movements of her head tails, each little piece of her helping to reassure him that this is reality, and it was only a nightmare. Thinking about it turns his stomach still, but at least he can dismiss the urge to run to scrub blood he never spilled away, or prove his loyalty which was never tested. Even if he can still feel the kickback of his blaster. 

“No, General Secura.” He can’t help but think of it again, and he knows his hands are shaking so he stands at ease to hide them. “I woke up and couldn’t get back to sleep, is all.”

She closes her eyes and makes a _listening to the force_ expression that he knows a little too well not to smile at.

“Commander,” his General says slowly with a tone of comforting affection, “You seem distressed. Is something wrong?” 

Ah, this song and dance. His hands stop shaking, and Bly lets out a breath he hadn’t realized he’d been holding. They have this conversation nearly every time after he wakes up, in some form or another. He settles back into his body, feeling truly assured for the first time since he woke up. Feeling like its flesh he’s really inhabiting , like he’s human, and sentient, and grounded.

“Just a dream, General.” The voice he uses this time is the one he’s been trained to address superior officers with. Confident, level, and firm. She can see right through him, she does, and Bly knows she does, but that’s not important. If she has to know how off kilter he is, then fine. But she doesn’t have to see it. “Nothing a short walk can’t cure.”

A gentle expression takes her face. “Do you want to talk about it?

“No, Sir.” 

He doesn’t even have to think about it, because he _never_ wants to tell her. He never wants her to know. What would he even say? Yes Sir, I have constant nightmares where I execute you and any Jedi near you. Yeah. _That_ would go over well. He’d be decommissioned or reset like a droid. Besides, it’s not like it’s anything to actually worry about. Bly’s talked to his brothers across the ranks and everyone that he’s asked has admitted to having the dreams when pressed. Every last one. It’s to the point where he always has someone more experienced stay with the shinies until they’ve all had their first dreams. Even if it isn’t normal for natborns, it’s clearly normal for clones. 

“In that case…” her voice remains cool but calming, “You should get some sleep.” 

He hesitates a moment. Being around the General is soothing. She’s _there_ , she’s okay, she’s _breathing_. He didn’t hurt her. 

“Bly…” she starts, and Bly sighs.

“Yes, sir.” He responds how he’s supposed to, like a good soldier, and turns back to head to the barracks. Bly doesn’t want to leave her side, but he reassures himself that if he’s well rested, he’ll be able to protect her better. 

Bly has the dream again the next time his space changes. It’s real, but then it's over and he wakes in the morning. He feels sick. This time he does scrub his skin raw. This time he practices at the range until his blaster sears his skin. This time he stumbles across his General instead of seeking her out. This time he feels guiltier than ever, because this time he recognized her after the order, and still couldn’t stop himself. 

Once again, her watchful eyes cut right through him.

“You seem unwell, Commander Bly.”

“Don’t worry about me, General. It was only a nightmare.” 

“Do you want to talk about it?”

“No, Sir.”

“Do you want to get some rest?”

“No, Sir. I’d rather get to work.”

Bly tries not to choke on his words, and lets her tone of voice wash over him. When General Secura asks, it seems like she means it. Like she _wants_ him to confide in her. The words sound like she cares about him, rather than the content of the dream. Every time they do this, Bly watches her serene expression and wonders. Maybe she does care. Maybe she doesn’t. Is she allowed to? From what he’s picked up, the Jedi are supposed to act with grace and compassion at all times but… are they allowed to actually care? 

He likes to think she cares. 

\--

Battles pass in a blur, missions, tasks, planets, each passing through his memory like sand through his fingers. If pressed, he could probably recount each of them in vivid but disconnected detail. They bleed together at the edges, a panorama of slurred images of war and loss and blood and pain. He doesn’t want to remember it.

In the center of it all is his General, blue skin contrasted against the red and yellows of war. Old brothers fall, new brothers come, then the new brothers die young again just like the troops before them. She’s the only constant he has. 

And still, his god forsaken nightmares make him tear apart that one rock he has left with his bare hands every single time. He has the dream, and he has it again, and again, and again, _and again._ They’ve gotten more and more frequent, and now he has them every time he steps onto the ship. Every time he steps onto a _different_ ship. Every damned new world and every single new place they go on that world. Sometimes he has multiple. He’s killed her so many times aboard the cruiser that the line between reality and sleep is so fuzzy that he constantly doubts his own perceptions there. He kills her. He murders her. He hurts her nearly every night. It’s too much, and he can’t fight it anymore. 

Bly has the nightmares constantly, and he learns. It’s easier to just let it happen Its easier if he doesn’t fight it. Just get it over with, kill her, wake up, find her. See her. Know that she’s safe. 

“Good morning, Commander.”

“Good morning, General Secura.”

“You seem upset.”

“There’s nothing to worry about, Sir.” 

“If there was, you could talk to me about it.”

“Thank you Sir, I’m alright.” 

Same song. Same dance.

Same scenario, different place. 

Same conversation, different words.

A paint by numbers encounter every time. Still, even if the lines are always the same, he 

appreciates how the colors change. 

\--

They’re on some forested marshy planet he’s forgotten the name of, hunting a stolen senator. Bly slogs through the muck of the bog, every step a battle in itself. Each footfall sinks past the puddles of algae filled water and into the thick mud below. His feet are soaked and so cold he wouldn’t be surprised if he lost some toes from this. Earlier the struggling of his men surrounded him, and every so often he had to reach out and catch someone so they didn’t fall into the muck after tripping over a buried tree root. But it’s just him following his General now on a perimeter sweep, and Bly’s lost count of how many leeches he’s pulled off of his joints, and how many bugbites he must have. 

He looks to his General with admiration and amazement. She’s as splattered with mud as he is, and he imagines the creatures of the swamp are getting to her just as much as they did her men. Maybe they’re staying away from her out of respect. He smiles to himself as she curses and reaches down into the muck and struggles for a moment, only to straighten up and throw something as hard as she can into the woods. So much for the respect theory, then. 

Bly could watch her forever. The powerful ripple of muscle under her skin, the grace with which she moves even while battling her way through this harsh terrain. He won’t let his mind wander too far, it’s inappropriate to think of his General too fondly, he knows that, he _knows,_ but what harm could watching the sway of her lekku do? 

The sight of her back is familiar, he knows how her body shifts and moves, but the movement of his General’s head tails is ever changing. He’s learned much by watching them, he can tell when she’s stressed, or curious, or relaxed, just from the way they move and bunch up. How much they move with each turn of her head changes constantly, depending on her mood and what she’s wearing and how tight her wrappings are today. The warmth that spreads through him as he watches her fight off the discomfort of the swamp. And then it’s gone. 

_“Execute Order --”_

The blood in his veins shock freezes like it always does, and there’s that snapping click in his head just like there always is. Bly’s body briefly spasms as the ice grips down to his bones, snarling into his intestines and swallowing his heart. Oh. He’s dreaming. 

His arms raise his blaster without protest, Bly just letting his muscles move as they will. His body takes aim between her shoulder blades, moving like he’s being puppeted, and his finger squeezes the trigger. Bly shoots her, and she splashes into the muck, but it's okay. He didn’t shoot her, not really. He knows that. 

It doesn’t help much. 

He lowers his blaster, letting its weight settle in his arms, and waits. But Bly doesn’t wake up. It’s only a dream, why isn’t he waking up? Bly drops his weapon into the mud. She’s dead, why isn’t he waking up? Why isn’t he waking up? He looks around wildly, searching for something, anything, any sign that he’s dreaming, but he can’t find it. 

Bly looks to his General, laying in the mud, and then he sees her move. She can’t seem to be able to move very well, but she’s alive still, and that wont do. She raises her head barely above the water, gasping for air, and his body lurches forward towards her. She turns her head and looks up at him, scared and confused as his legs crouch down beside her.

Then his body does something that, for the first time in a long while, Bly actively protests. His arm reaches out and touches the back of her head, his fingers spread below the roots of her lekku, her skin hot against his glove, and he _pushes._ Bly’s hand shoves her face first into the filthy water. 

He screams against his teeth and tongue without a sound, begs for his flesh to obey him and stop, _stop!_ His general struggles against him, her hands trying to find purchase in the mud, desperately trying to save her life. Shoot her, just _shoot her!_ He screams at himself. Just grab the pistol on your hip and shoot her! If his voice weren’t trapped, flinging itself against the walls of his chest, his throat would be raw and torn. He doesn’t cry until the tip of a lek gently caresses his wrist. The tears drop against the inside of his visor, momentarily glitching his HUD. He doesn’t want to do this. He wants to stop, he wants it to _stop! Please, General, please, die quickly, please stop moving please stop--_

And then she does. 

And Bly wakes up. 

Bly spasms as he comes back to reality. He bolts up, frantically looking around to take in his environment. He’s in the camp that he and his men set up. That’s right, they had set up camp, and he and General Secura had returned hours earlier. Sleeping brothers surround him, laid about around a small fire. He can hear the chatter of the watch, mainly Kile. If it were any other night, he’d consider scolding Sideswipe for not keeping him quiet. 

He reaches out to the space next to him and finds it empty. Bly blinks, then shakes the sensation from himself and presses a hand into the cold compacted soil in that hollow spot, pushing himself up and onto his feet. Bly stumbles to the edge of their camp, to the water. A rookie calls to him, but Bly doesn’t respond. He’s aware of some of his subordinates rousing to see what's happening, but he doesn’t care. 

The dream hits him again, and he collapses bodily into the mud, gagging as he does. With an almighty heave he vomits, acrid thick bile scorching his nose and mouth. In a moment there are hands on his back and arms, comforting and anchoring him. The foul taste of his sick coats his tongue so that even between waves he gets no respite. It hurts. 

Then it’s over. He sits back on his legs, gasping for air, snot and sweat and tears and phlegm and all manner of filth dripping from his face and chin. His brothers recoil from him, shifting away, and he wonders why until a gentle voice speaks with a rylothian accent. 

“Bly, what’s wrong?” 

He can’t bear to look at her, and he flinches when the warm tips of her fingers touch the back of his buzzed head. Bly turns his face away from her and tries to wipe some of the slimy mixture from his chin. He bites his lip hard enough to break skin. 

“Bly?” She kneels next to him, and he still faces away. He doesn’t want her to see him like this, weak and shivering, wrist deep in a slurry of mud and vomit. For once he doesn’t want to see her, either. He doesn’t want to see the blue, the brilliant brown eyes, the patterns on her skin, because he knows that for once it won’t bring him any comfort. He’s sitting, gasping for breath, throat raw and scalded, hands as cold as ice, and yet still he feels her under his palm fighting for her life. General Secura is safe. She’s safe, and alive, and he didn’t hurt her. 

The thought feels empty. 

She reaches out to touch his face. Bly flinches away. 

“Bly…” She tries to touch him again, only for him to reject it once more. “Tell me what’s wrong, please?” 

Bly takes a deep breath, deep enough that it hurts, and spits out a glob of phlegm. 

“Nothing. Just a dream.” 

“Bly--” 

“Please.” His voice cracks. _“Please.”_

He raises his arm to hide his face in the crook of it, and when he speaks, it's in a whispered whimper.

“It was only a nightmare, sir.” 

The silence that falls is heavy with the concern of both his general and his men. Eventually, his general relents. She stands, and as she walks away, the touches of his brothers return. An arm is thrown around him, and a face pressed to his back. In the morning, when the sun rises on this mudball, he’ll be perfect. He’ll be composed and strong and unshakable, a foundation as solid as a singularity. For now though… for now he focuses on the hands, and the brothers trying to comfort him. The brothers who know what he dreamt. Who know what he did. But the contact isn’t the one he wants, and he lets himself break. Bly crumbles, and lets the tears fall and burn as he feels an absence of arms to crawl into. 

He cries, and he misses Brine now more than ever. 

\--

A standard month whips by like the wind, and his boots hit ground on Felucia. They’ve been there a few days, trampling through the brush, thorns and insects taking him to pieces. The jungle is alive. His ears are full of animals calling out to find mates or scream at rivals, alongside the chirping and buzzing of insects. There are enormous blue and red plants, curling for what feels like clicks above their heads. It doesn’t reach them down here, but he can hear the wind rustling the leaves above.

As always he’s walking behind his General, watching the sway of her lekku falling in time with her step through the fog in his visor. Through it all, the bug bites, the stinging cuts, the occasional reeking plant or animal corpse, the _humidity_ stands out. The vents in his helmet can’t even keep up, their filters are saturated and _leaking_. He hates this karking planet, and can’t remember the last time he wanted a mission over so badly. 

Usually he can find a reason to bear with it but this mission? It blows. 

Bly sighs a sort of grumbling snort and looks to his men. A lot of them are rookies, and having trouble keeping up with the terrain. It doesn’t surprise him. After all, under their helmets are faces that even Bly would consider too close to those of children. On his right, in stark contrast to their inexperienced fumbling, are Bly’s ARCs: Bash and Dapple. The two of them are moving through the plant life and keeping their footing like they’re walking through a grassland instead of a hostile jungle. 

Bash has always been headstrong and ferocious, all he had to learn was control, but Dapple’s come a long way. It’s been a long time since he was a shiny losing his nerve and running into no-man’s land. Brine would be proud of him. Bly certainly is. 

On his other side are a few clones that have been with the Star Corps for longer than the rookies, but it's not by much for many of them. There’s a kid at his heels named Rip who only earned his paint a few weeks prior. 

Beep Beep--

Bly startles, before tapping the button on his vambrace to accept the transmission. He wonders who it is. Then the cold hits him. Oh. 

“Bly?” She glances back at him for just a moment before igniting her lightsaber and quickly assuming a defensive position. His General prepares to defend them. “Do you think there are clankers?” she asks quickly and confidently. Her back is completely open to him, her blindspots trusted without reservation to her commander. 

Bly swallows. He can’t do this again. 

His hands raise his weapon, shaking. Cold, so karking _cold._ A ripple runs through the boys, and they all take aim at General Secura as well. He wants to rebel, but then he remembers the marsh, and grits his teeth. 

“No.” 

She looks back at him. 

And he fires. 

Bly closes his eyes after the first shot, unable to watch her fall again. Another shot. Another. Even if its just a dream, even if he’s asleep, he doesn’t want her to be in pain. He can’t kill her with his hands again. He can’t. Not again. Not again.

He keeps shooting until the blaster’s heat blisters his hands, and he doesn’t look once. When he finally opens his eyes, Bly swallows the bile in his throat. She’s laying there, still, quiet, smoking, and bleeding. The smell of charred flesh is thick in the air. He chokes on it and feels sick. But he takes a deep breath, drops his blaster to the ground, and waits to wake up. 

And he waits. 

_And he waits._

“Sir…?” 

Bly turns to Rip. His voice is faint, scared.

“Sir, I want to wake up now.” 


	2. Chapter 2

Who knows how many revolutions have passed Coruscant by since time bled together. Very little has changed. 

CC-5052 is a servant of The Empire, and as far as he remembers, he has never been anything else. Blood seeps into the fabrics of his blacks, invisible but present. It doesn’t bother him. Not the gore under his nails or the stench of it that clings to his skin. It doesn’t. 

He catches a glimpse of his reflection in a passing pane of transparisteel, and something compels him. CC-5052 turns and looks his death mask in the eyes. It's stark white. He reaches up and touches the space between his visors, dragging his fingertips down to the chin. A void of color, sterile and lifeless. It’s expressionless, a perfect facsimile of every other clone’s kit. Empty. Utterly interchangeable, the same way every Stormtrooper’s is. 

He turns from the mask and continues on his route. 

Very little has changed. CC-5052 still leads troops on missions. Those troops still die. Things are more the same than different. One thing, though. One thing has changed. A small secret that he keeps, even from himself most days. 

When his eyes are open, he hopes he’ll wake up.

When he lies down to rest, he hopes he doesn’t. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I hope you were entertained. Please let me know what you think, however much or little you have to say :)


End file.
